Date:  Fri, 5 Dec 1997 12:44:21 -0500 (EST)
Message-Id: <199712051744.MAA24441@locke.ccil.org>
Reply-To: And Rosta <a.rosta@UCLAN.AC.UK>
Sender: Lojban list <LOJBAN@CUVMB.BITNET>
From: And Rosta <a.rosta@UCLAN.AC.UK>
Organization: University of Central Lancashire
Subject:      partial instantiations (was: Re: GLI Re: do all nu's happen?)
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To: John Cowan <cowan@LOCKE.CCIL.ORG>
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X-From-Space-Date: Fri Dec  5 12:44:23 1997
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Jorge:
> >>             le nu le bolci cu farlu le loldi co'a fasnu
> >>             The ball's falling to the floor started to happen.
> >
>  >If x2 of farlu is the endpoint of a path that need only be
> >partially traversed, then this is not a problematic example
> >even if "nu" means "actual event".
>
> Well, if that is the case then a better English gloss might be
> "x1 falls towards x2". Also in that case {le nu le bolci cu farlu
> le loldi cu mulno} = "The ball's falling to the floor is complete",
> would not require that the ball end up in the floor, which is
> kind of against what I would expect.

I agree, so I think that x2 of farlu *does* have to be reached.

> >But otherwise, the x2 of farlu must actually be reached, why
> >would you choose to say "farlu le toldi"?
>
> It might be relevant to the situation:
>
>     le nu lei sicni cu farlu lei mi xance cu cfari i ku'i da jgari sy
>     The coins' falling into my hands started to happen,
>     but someone caught them.
>
> The interesting thing was that they'd end up in my hand, not
> that they were on their way there.

Right. So if a pu`i nu is a pu`i fasnu, then your example is
faulty, and you need to say something other than "le nu". That's
where this subthread began, with you saying that "le du`u"
should be used, and me disagreeing.

[I don't know what the difference between ca`a and pu`i is.]

> I now think that a {ca'a nu} has to be a {ka'e fasnu}.
>
> That would seem to agree with usage, wouldn't it?

Not necessarily. It could be that a ca`a/pu`i nu is a
ca`a/pu`i fasnu, but that a bare nu tends to be understood
with implicit ka`e much more than is common with other selbri.
I think that would be the most conservative and best solution.

As for whether it agrees with usage, it could if the selbri
with nu sumti that are not necessarily ca`a/pu`i fasnu are
suitably defined. For example, {nitcu lo nu} would mean
"x1 needs there to be in the world of x1 some counterpart of
x2". But if so, then all the selbri that take a du`u argument
could equally well be defined so that they can take a nu argument
instead.

To summarize, I would go for

(a) ca`a/pu`i nu = ca`a/pu`i fasnu
(b) always using nu in preference to du`u, except when there is
a relevant x2 of du`u, in order not to imply a spurious distinction
between nu and du`u. In other words, I would take {lo nu broda kei}
to be equivalent to {lo du`u broda kei be zi`o}.

[This is not my ideal solution, but it seems the best in the
circumstances.]

--And